The rain started, officially, yesterday afternoon and it really started coming down last evening when we were driving home from my parents. Now I’m sitting at my desk listening to the rain tumble down the roof and drip from the eaves. The mist hangs so thick over the lake that the near point I can see from my window is a myopic blur. In my last blog I mentioned how much more there is to smell as spring creeps in. Now, listening to the raindrops on the roof, I’m reminded of how noisy the melted world can be. Sure the wind blows and squirrels chatter and boots scrunch on snow, but for the most part, winter is a muffled, insular sensory time. Now we have the drip of raindrops, the slap of tires driving through puddles, the crunch of gravel, and the chickadees’ spring song along with new smells and sights. I had my 25th birthday yesterday. I’m sure at some point in my short life I thought 25 was ancient and that I worried I wouldn’t have done anything when I reached this point in life. Now that I am a quarter of a century old, I can honestly say, looking back on things that I’m pretty pleased with how it’s all gone. Of course, there are things that might have gone better if they’d happened a different way and there are definitely some things (*cough* relationships *cough*) to bemoan, but all in all in this first quarter, I’ve learned a lot, I’ve seen a lot and I dare say, I’ve done a lot. And since, as one of the waitresses at work told me yesterday, I have a good twenty years ahead of me (“everything after 45 sucks,” she said) I plan to continue to make the most of this fleeting fast life I’ve been given.
The birthday in and of itself was fine and not without some lovely bits. I had to work yesterday, which made me a little cranky (and my tips reflected it!) but when I got there I found that another waitress had made birthday brownies in little heart-shaped silicone pans. It made me smile so much. We had dinner with my parents and afterwards, we went downtown to get a drink and watch some first day action from the Minnesota Boys State High School Hockey Tournament. We even got Dad to come down for a little while (!)
Now I have a beautiful bouquet of flowers sitting next to my printer from my brother. And, and, (are you reading this Lisa?!) there’s a brand new camera right next to me from Andy! I’ve had a refurbished Kodak since Christmas 2004 and the thing has been a battle horse. It’s gone on four overseas trips and I’ve never had a problem with picture quality. Unfortunately, it’s a dinosaur: huge and heavy, with a lens cover that no longer automatically opens and a hearty appetite for batteries. I feel a little bit like a traitor now that there’s a lovely new Canon PowerShot D10 resting on top of my day planner. After all, the Kodak was still working all right. . . . . I’ve heard lots of good things about Canon cameras – although I wish they didn’t create sooooo many shortcuts on my desktop when I install their software -- and I’ll have a great opportunity to test this model out on next month’s travels. It should do pretty well on the home front too: considering that the new camera is shockproof, waterproof, and freeze-proof, and, as Andy quipped, Ada-proof, it should be a pretty good fit for life in the woods. This week I’m signing a lot of contracts that probably mean, come March 31st, my waitressing days are a thing of the past. I’m excited, a little overwhelmed, and horribly unfocused. The novel rewrites have to get finished this month because it’s becoming clear it’s going to be on the backburner until next fall and I need to get some other assignments out the door quickly so I have time for any extra work I may take on before the month is done.
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